Nadler questions Supreme Court ethics after Alito flag debacle: ‘None of them have clean hands’

Rep. Jerry Nadler (DN.Y.) brought the question of Supreme Court ethics back to light after Justice Samuel Alito came under fire earlier this week for an inverted American flag allegedly flying outside his Virginia home in 2021.

“None of them have clean hands, none of them have clean hands,” Nadler said during a Saturday appearance on MSNBC’s “The Weekend.” “And again, I would say we need two things. We need to impose a code of ethics. And we need term limits on the Supreme Court.”

Nadler, the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, is just the latest lawmaker scrutinizing Alito after The New York Times reported Thursday that the inverted flag flew outside his home in Alexandria, Virginia, on January 17, 2021, and potentially for several days, shortly after the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol.

He said Alito did not deny that the flag flew “for several days” when the judge spoke with “Fox News Sunday” host Shannon Bream on Friday about the report.

“That tells me it was OK for him,” Nadler said Saturday. “If he had flown for a few hours and he found out and said ‘take it off,’ that might be a different thing, but he flew for several days.”

“He should certainly recuse himself from any case related to January 6th, from any case related to President Trump,” he continued, “because he is associated with the ‘Stop the Steal’ movement now whether he wants to or not.”

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) was the first to ask Alito to recuse himself from all cases related to the 2020 election and the January 6 insurrection. Shortly thereafter, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (DN.Y.) said that Alito, a George W. Bush appointee, should at least apologize for “disrespecting” the American flag.

Following The Times’ report, Alito said he had “no involvement” with the flag. Instead, he claimed he was “briefly put out” by his wife in response to a neighbor’s use of insulting language on his yard signs.

Judicial experts told the media outlet that Alito violated ethics rules by flying the flag, which could call into question his neutrality regarding January 6 and presidential election cases.

The ethics of Alito and Justice Clarence Thomas have come under scrutiny following revelations that they accompanied billionaires on vacation and accepted lavish gifts without reporting them. Since then, lawmakers have pushed for a more defined code of ethics for the high court.

This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story